Fact of the day

Information is the most powerful weapon.

Monday

Fact N°
2433

Men are more likely to engage in social shopping than women.

Social shopping, which integrates social networking with internet commerce, has traditionally been considered the domain of women but according to an ROI Research study, men are actually more likely to engage in most of the aspects of social shopping (e.g. finding store information via social networks and looking up product reviews). Men were also more active in every major social networking site than women, with the sole exception of Facebook (used by 97% of female respondents and 96% of male respondents).

Tuesday

Fact N°
2434

State officials in Kentucky are attempting to give away a bridge.

A 450-foot bridge in southeastern Kentucky has become "functionally obsolete," too narrow, and with too little clearance for modern traffic but remains structurally sound. The structure dates back to 1929, making it eligible for the National Register of Historic Places. As such, officials would prefer to give it away instead of just demolishing it and they're even willing to dismantle the bridge piece-by-piece and deliver it to another state, or even an individual, who might have a use for it. This is actually the second bridge Kentucky has attempted to give away in the past five years (the bridge was ultimately demolished).

Wednesday

Fact N°
2435

Music influences how we taste wine.

At study at Heriot-Watt University in Scotland separated wine-tasting participants into five groups. Four of these listened to thematically different kinds of music (e.g "Carmina Burana" or the French rock band Nouvelle Vague) and one, the control group, tasted the wine in silence. The music influenced the participants' ability to taste to that many ascribed the general tone of the music to the flavor of the wine they were drinking ("powerful and heavy" for the "Carmina Burana" group, for example), even though they were all drinking exactly the same thing.

Thursday

Fact N°
2436

Scientists have isolated cells that contribute to aging and can remove them to slow the effects.

Senescent cells, which cause inflammation and build up in aging tissue, appear to contribute to everything from cataracts to cancer, and Mayo Clinic researchers have shown it's possible to remove them entirely. The researchers engineered a type of mouse in which senescent cells could be purged via medication and demonstrated that mice without these cells aged far slower, retaining their energy and youthful physical characteristics. Even mice that were not given the treatment until middle age had further aging delayed (though already-apparent effects were not reversed).

Friday

Fact N°
2437

Frontier families are more fertile.

Researchers at the University of Montreal studied records from 1.2 million Quebecers, spanning nearly 200 years. Families who settled on the frontiers outside existing settlements tended to marry younger and have more children than their peers. The end result of this increased activity (about 15% more than settlement families) is that frontier-family genes are more prevalent in current populations -- one to four times more, in the case of the study.

Saturday

Fact N°
2438

Women who use vibrators are more sexually satisfied overall.

In the first-ever major survey on the subject, Indiana University researchers asked 3,000 men and women for their perspectives on women's use of vibrators (and, for women, their corresponding sexual experiences). Women who approved of the use of vibrators, and who had used one in the past month, reported higher arousal, increased sexual satisfaction and less pain during sex (which could be due either to an effect from the vibrators themselves, or a reflection of the fact that women who use them are typically more comfortable with sex in general, according to researchers). The positive effect was not present among women who had a negative view of sex toys.

Sunday

Fact N°
2439

Taking breaks from sitting reduces your cancer risk.

It's already been documented that physical inactivity in general leads to increased risk for some cancers (adults who are physically active have nearly a 40% lower risk for colon cancer, for example). According to the American Institute for Cancer Research, simply sitting for long periods of time can increase the risk of cancer, even among those who are otherwise physically active. Even as little as one minute of activity per hour can reduce the health risks of prolonged sitting (which, researchers noted, is a risk wholly separate from exercise level or body weight).